Theory: Hitler started Op Barb 45 days late - could have conquered Soviets if on time

[japinard]

Have any of you given much thought to the rumour that Hitler actually started Operation Barborossa 30-60 days later than he'd planned because he was enraged at the problems in Yugoslavia? Apparently he diverted forces that were originally intended for the Eastern offensive to crush the anti-German rebellions in the Balkans. This 1-2 months delay helped set Germany up for an awful attack by Mother nature...

I'm curious though, if Hitler HAD started Operation Barborossa 1-2 months earlier - would they have successfully decimated Russia's remaining vital cities and resources?

Or, was it inevitable Germany would have lost the Eastern front no matter what weather had befallen them?

Personally, I tend to think that no one could "truly" conquer Russia with it being so "wide" and spread out, the supply line issue would ruin any invading army...

[JerseyJohn]

Could well be. Aside from time considerations, as mention the Yugoslavian / Greece situation, there was the wear and tear on panzer units returning to their jump off positions and the Creete operation deprived Army Group South of the paratroops and other infantry originally assigned to it. Then there was also lost aircraft and others going into the Russian campaign without a proper overhaul and then having to work without it for several months to come.

Even starting on June 22nd, I think they could have won it if Hitler had restrained himself, allowed Army Group North to take Leningrad in August instead of removing it's armor and then allowed Army Group Center to take Moscow the following month instead of diverting it's armor as well! These were ridiculous actions. The German Army could have moved like a syth from north to south after taking Leningrad first, securing the entire Baltic, and Moscow second, demoralizing the USSR, rupturing it's rail system and giving the Eastern Front a perfect supply base for later operations. Instead he saw to it that his troops would spend the winter freezing.

Start it in May 1941, at full stregnth and I agree, it should be a shoe in.

[japinard]

If the German's stopped after taking Moscow, Leningrad etc... let's say "they're supply lines ran tight", do you think that still would have spelled the end of Russia?

Do you know where the factories were located that churned out the majority of the IL-2 Sturmoviks, T-34's, KV-1's and the IS 1-2's?

It seems Russia could mobilize anyone from anywhere, skilled or not... and if these factories were not destroyed... EVEN if Germany secured Leningrad and Moscow... without Germany taking those factories which were pumping out 1,000's of units a month... it seems Russia would still have had plenty of fight left in her. Or not?

[JerseyJohn]

Konstantin V. Kotelnikov posted a lot of information on the relocation of Soviet industry beyond the Urals. A search on the SC forum might pull it out; I think he posted it last Spring or Summer.

I think the Germans could have conquered all of European Russia stopping at the Ural Mountains and the north-east portion of the Caspean Sea, provided Hiter didn't screw it up for his generals. Unfortunately he'd have needed to show a little intelligence and use the hatred so many millions of Soviets felt for the Soviet system and it's incredible abuses. Instead he sent the SS in behind the front line troops to loot, pillage and murder the population.

By doing this Hitler insured his own defeat. Given a choice of a gigantic supporting population or a gigantic hostile population behind your lines, we'd call the first choice a no-brainer today. Hitler's generals felt the same way and couldn't understand why he was ruining things for them.

His interference in tactical matters didn't help either.

From Dunkirk on Hitler became more and more his own sabateur.

Getting back to your original question, though, I think Germany would have needed to draw a line somewhere in Russia and east of that line a Soviet State in some form would have run things. I think the two would have agreed to terms after Germany had conquered an area running roughly from Archangel to Gorky (east of Moscow) and then south to the Volga down and into the Caspian Sea -- Germany would have had all of the Caucasus with it's oil, the Ukraine with it's agriculture and minerals and Belorussia in the north.

[japinard]

Wow, Russia wound have been nothing more than Greater Mongolia at that point...

[Kuniworth]

this is not sc 2 related. Locking this.

[Scorpion_sk]

Hm, yes, it´s always interesting to speculate the what-ifs of the war....and those are among the high points of interest of Grand Strategy games.

Yes, if Mussolini hadn´t fooled around with Greece, and gotten his arse kicked there, Barbarossa would have begun on time, and would have stood a much greater chance at taking Moscow, and possibly the Caucasus too. This would have probably meant a very much longer war than it was....

Throw in the possibility of German Intelligence getting ahold of the Normandy Invasion plans and repelling it, or perhaps the chance of Rommel getting adequate supply and taking North Africa...yes, there are plenty of very realistic chances of Germany making things very tough for the allies.

Perhaps, with many more things going their way, Germany could have beaten the allies in the actual war, and made the U.S. give up the war in Europe in the short term.....

But in the long term, especially Soviet resistance and the ever-increasing industrial superiority of the U.S. would have probably been enough - IF the U.S. totally committed itself to overthrowing Germany, even if it would cost her hundreds of thousands more servicemen.

And then there´s the A-Bomb....

[Wachtmeister]

The original start date for Barbarossa was indeed early May '41. The coventional reason for the delay until 22 June was the perceived need to eliminate Yougosalvia and Greece to secure the Axis southern flank. However, the spring of '41 was unusually wet, such that eastern European rivers, such as the Bug in Poland, were in full flood until the first part of June '41. The difficulty in making large scale combat crossings of flooded rivers, combined with the near impassible state of Polish/Russian roads in wet weather, may well have delayed the actual start of Barbarossa intil early to mid June, regardless of events in the Balkans.

Aside from the delay in starting Barbarossa, the redeployment to the Balkans of of over two full armies and associated armoured and motorized formations may have been the more detrimental effect, since many of these forces could not be refitted and redeployed in time for the initial onslaught on 22 June.

Had the additional troops, especially Panzer and motorized units, been available to Army Group South, perhaps better progress would have been made towards taking Kiev. If so, than the decision to divert Army Group Center mobile forces south to encircle Kiev, instead of pressing on to Moscow, might have been avoided.

[japinard]

So had they started a month earlier and been 300 miles further when the torential rains hit - would the outcome have been the same? Being further into Soviet territory and then cut in half by washed out roads and raging rivers?

[The Dutch Army]

If Hitler won at the east front he wanted to destroy Moscow to the last building.

If I am correct

Hitler Is shots a weirdo

[fischkopf]

Hard to say what would have happened.

Both armies were of the same size, a little over 3 million men strong. But Russia at the time had another _17 million_ men of fighting age ready to be conscripted. That's a lot of men...

[JerseyJohn]

Another aspect of the problem was the difference in railroad guage. It was wider in Russia and the rails had to be narrowed before European rolling stock could move on it. Naturally the same was true for the Russians whenever they regained territory, the rails needed to be widened again before they could use it.

Nearly all the Eastern European and Russian roads were unpaved at the time, so rain and mud, even aside from swollen rivers, is a major factor.

Wachtmeister

Good point about the late raines in Spring of 41, but as you also said the redeployment and return of all those troops, as well as the involved Luftwaffe units is probably even more significant than the starting date. Several German generals stressed that point to Lidell Hart in interviews during the fifties and sixties.

[Panzeh]

I think the Germans were lucky to get as far as they did. Their supply situation was dire from day 1.

[marklavar]

This myth about the Germans conquering Russia if only they hadn't been delayed by the Balkans is as old as the war itself. And total garbage. The Germans never really had a realistic chance of defeating the USSR by themselves (the feeble Axis allies making no difference). The numerical superiority of the Russians was such that only a massive internal upheaval or revolution could have prevented the USSR from gaining the upper hand - eventually. The 'blitzkrieg' approach could never work with the USSR because of the huge distances involved and the consequent supply and logistics problems. Therefore this would bog down into a war of attrition, in which the Germans would be slowly worn down. The ONLY real hope of victory the Germans had was to persuade the bulk of the Soviet prisoners they took to join them in a war of Russian and Ukrainian liberation against Communism. This manpower boost of, say, an extra million or million and a half men, could have made the difference to several critical battles - who knows? But with the partisans fighting alongside the Germans, not against them, the morale of the Soviet troops would have suffered badly. As it happened, it was the support of the civilian population that helped the Red Army to maintain its impetus. If only the Germans had been less stupid.......

[JerseyJohn]

Well, that seems a lot like what some of them have been saying all along; that the Germans won battles but defeated themselves in the war by turning conquered populations into enemies instead of the happily liberated.

Except they didn't start that stupidity in Russia, they started it with their own people when they wrote off the Jews, then extended it to the Czechs and Poles -- how many tens of millions of potentially sympathetic citizens did Germany waste before ever setting foot in Russia?

As for the actual battles I've been reading a lot of nonsense here about how lucky they were. Bull -- Army Group North swept through the Baltic States as though it were moving on greased skids. The only reason they didn't take Leningrad in August of 1941 is because Hitler pulled their armor and started acting like a moron. How can anyone call their string of victories and the millions of troops they put out of action luck?

I read things like that and wonder how anyone can write such drivel. State opinions, sure, but don't start changing facts to suit some half thought out theory with no basis in reality.

[reiver]

Jersey John

I agree with your comments on Barbarossa -

The German Forces swept through the Soviets with a string of encirclements and victories that in terms of prisoners taken and equipment destroyed/captured are quite staggering. I beleive that if Hitler had left things alone and not held up start of Typhoon (Operation to take Moscow)they would have got to Moscow and secured it before the Winter set in.

This in tandem with a more pragmatic approach to the conquered population and POW's might have been enough to topple Stalin and his regime - who were not exactly the model of a caring progressive government.

On another note and you have made reference to this many times - I read one account that suggested that the very policy of Concentration Camps and Genocide ensured that economically the 3rd Reich could never win, due to the loss of manpower, the waste of resources and rail capacity, sheer ineficiency of slave labour and amount of guards who could otherwise have been of fighting the Russians.

Regards

Reiver

[Komet-163]

I agree that had the germans not switched objectives then moscow would have definally fallen thus leaving stalin the urals, which also would have been in range (just) of the german medium bombers, however as proven in the battle of britain the bombers are useless in a full blown air war so a '42 campaign was always going to be needed to rid the last orginised defence, thus leaving the remaining soviet states to fight partizan warfare. however this begs the question who's idea was it that no german forces would be in russia november '41- feb '42?

[Blashy]

Anyone notice that any IF discussions regarding the Germans always comes down to some dumbass decisions made by Hitler.

Scary to think what would have happened if his saavy generals made the decisions.

Maybe that's why in SC1 without a bid system the Axis always wins, it does not take a genius to not repeat his blunders.

[marklavar]

Hitler is an easy scapegoat because he is a figure of universal hatred, but the truth is that many German Generals and Field-Marshals made many strateguc blunders at various times which cannot be attributed to Hitler's meddling. What Germany needed was a 'Generalissimo' of the highest strategic insight, with dictatorial powers on all military matters, in the mold of Ludendorff in WW1. The best candidate for job would have been Manstein, but Hitler distrusted him and the chance was gone. The eastern front disasters of 1944 might never have happened with Manstein in charge.

[Kuniworth]

Originally posted by marklavar:

The Germans never really had a realistic chance of defeating the USSR by themselves

Ahh this is simply not true in for many reasons. A long term war was a sure loss but in 1941 there was a chance that Germany could knock out the bulk of the red army.

What often is bypassed in this discussion is that the majority of russian manpower along with the railroad net were avilable in the areas conquered by Germany in november 1941. Operation Otto, the plan OKH worked on for 4 months was a far better plan than Barbarossa. Fortunately Hitler dismissed it and went on with a plan that not only was inconsequent but also altered repeatedly during the campaign.

JerseyJohn is also right that there were no luck involved in the german attack. Minsk fell june 28th, Smolensk fell july 16th, Kiev september 19th and so on and on. Truth is that Germany could have "won" the campaign in 1941, but the chance was spoiled far earlier than operation typhoon october-december 1941.

[Kuniworth]

Originally posted by marklavar:

The eastern front disasters of 1944 might never have happened with Manstein in charge.

In 1944 it was probably more a question of elastic defence and allowance to pull back than wether or not Manstein was in charge. Manstein could not halt the steamroller in 1943 and could definately not have done it in 1944.

[Kuniworth]

Originally posted by marklavar:

Hitler is an easy scapegoat because he is a figure of universal hatred, but the truth is that many German Generals and Field-Marshals made many strateguc blunders at various times which cannot be attributed to Hitler's meddling.

Very true.

[jon_j_rambo]

It's about time you guys finally figured it out. EVERY time there is a debate about the German Nazis it goes the SAME way.

1) It's ONLY Hitler's fault

2) ONLY Hitler was a Nazi

3) The rest of us were just good Germans

Whatever, tell that to my Uncle in the Battle of Britain. The main reason the Germans act sorry...is because they lost or they'd throw you in the oven too.

[Blashy]

The Allies also made blunders.

But in the end, the Germans had the upper hand from the get go and Hitler thought he had it all figured out.

Oh and where do you see me ever say the rest of the Germans were "good", many were aware of the attempted genocide and yet turned a blind eye. And many other attrocities.

I'm talking war strategy here, nothing to do we politics or the german people being good or bad.

[SeaMonkey]

Marklavar I applaud your wisdom, the German attack on the USSR had a forgone conclusion. This was a struggle of ideologies as much as armed force and with a proper perspective of the vast scale and intensity of the combat, sheer power of strength, will and instinct would prevail. All the "what ifs" are superfluous.